Grateful Mike: Things You Didn’t Know

Did you know Grateful Mike had a Wyoming State Tribune paper route in west Cheyenne when he was just 8 years old?

I inherited the paper route from my sister when she got tired of it and it consisted of homes outside F.E. Warren Air Force Base in the Pioneer Park School area.

The route was bordered by Pershing Blvd. on the north, Talbot Court to the south, Hynds Blvd. on the west side and Cribbon Ave. to the east.

The Wyoming State Tribune was the afternoon edition of the local newspaper, with a different slant than the morning paper, the Wyoming Eagle. They later consolidated to become one morning edition, the Wyoming Tribune Eagle.

Soon after starting the paper route, my younger brother split it up with me and before we knew it, we were earning what seemed like lots of money. Instead of rolling the papers with rubber bands, we would fold them and set them inside the customer's screen door. We collected big tips by bringing the paper directly to their door instead of throwing it out in the yard somewhere.

We had the paper route for eight years, until I got a job at Safeway in the Melton Shopping Center on Carlson. So I guess I could say I've been delivering the news to Cheyennites from a very young age.